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And I'm not saying that's not true. However, I am saying that a statement like "Rand Paul's filibuster is the reason for the change in opinion" is not empirically backed up by these two polls, taken a year apart. It could be that Rand's filibuster was so well received because opinion had already begun to shift, for example.

See this poll taken prior to the filibuster which gives similar numbers to the poll taken after the filibuster (from yet another polling place, with yet another phrasing).

Please don't become deluded enough to think that ANYTHING online actually has any real bearing with real life.

Twitter has who knows how many active users (Seriously, no one has concrete numbers) but let's assume we talk all the people with 8 or more followers, 50 million. Assuming that they are ALL in america.. that's 1/6th of all people in the US.

Reddit 43 million

The point though is assuming everyone twitter was talking about it (They weren't) and they are all in the US (they aren't) that's still not even close to the number you think it is. 24 percent support in the USA? Assuming that's correct, that'd be 1.5 times the CURRENT active twitter users as defined above, it'd be double the current reddit users.

Online is a major place, but it's in NO way "national" in any meaningful way.

True. Because the average American may not have even known about drones until they saw them flying overhead (assuming we will even know they are there). We are an overall complacent population, and that's really a big problem. Politicians love it, because it makes their job that much easier. And it lets them pass ridiculous bills like the NDAA and such with limited backlash. I am happy that states are nullifying the NDAA, but the fact that the president's approval rating stays this high in the face of continues loss of freedom tells you all you really need to know about how much people pay attention to politics in this country. Ok I guess I ranted.

Unfortunately, these are probably going to be the exact attacks the left will use on him. I just hope he takes it all in stride and keeps fighting for the american people rather than against his competition.

More unfortunately I think is that this kind of attack will be hugely successful. Almost no one will take the time to learn why people SHOULD BE opposed to the DoE yet when they hear him openly state "Yes of course I oppose the DoE...." they will instantaneously decide that he is "anti-education" regardless of the DoE empirically and quantifiably harming education in this country.